The best works of art have the power to build a bridge between the past, present, and future. Artistic expressions can connect us to where we came from and where we are going. There is one sequence in Ryan Coogler’s film “Sinners” — which just set the all-time record for Oscar nominations with a mind-boggling 16 — that is an argument for the eternal significance of film as an art form. At its best, film should be a combination of every individual art form into a rich tapestry that can only be expressed in, well, moving pictures. Coogler taps into that throughout the entirety of “Sinners,” and reaches transcendent heights in what has been dubbed the “Surreal Montage” scene, led by Miles Caton’s performance of the song “I Lied to You.” In recent months, I have had the chance to correspond with members of the crew who made this moment possible, including cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw, composer Ludwig Göransson, and songwriter Raphael Saadiq. All three of these folks were nominated by the Academy for their contributions to “Sinners.” I will now step out of the way and let their work and words do the talking.
For Cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw: What was your first reaction when Ryan Coogler explained the concept of the sequence to you in which Miles Caton sings “I Lied to You” and the past, present, and future of music collide? Did you immediately know how you wanted to approach capturing that scene as cinematographer, or did you go through multiple iterations of your decision making process?
Autumn Durald Arkapaw: Well, the first time I read it – it’s as beautiful on the page. You know, when you read something like that, I wasn’t surprised, because it was coming from Ryan and that’s how he is. I think when I first read it, I emailed him and I had a bunch of notes about the script and how excited I was, but I said “big imagination” after I read that sequence. What the filmmaker is asking you to do is to kind of go on a ride with them. He’s taking a very sharp turn in his storytelling, and he wants you to focus and you to feel that whole sequence. And you know, it talks about history and culture and blues music, and it was a really interesting way of taking a departure from reality – but also kind of giving the audience something to dream. It’s a dream. To dream and to go on this ride. So when you read it, your mind is all over the place. You don’t exactly know how it’s going to look yet because you want to talk to the filmmaker. So at first, I think he had presented some storyboards that he made that we all looked at. They’re beautiful. And then in talking to him, you have to start to think about it logistically as well, because it’s a big sequence. It’s going to take time. There’s a lot of departments collaborating. Right off the bat, he describes like – how when you read something, the walls are going to burn and go away. So if someone tells you that, then you have to start talking about it and like, “How are we achieving that?” You know, “Where are we shooting it? How do they burn? What does it look like when the camera goes up and down?” So it’s my job to really be there for Ryan in order to execute this beautiful idea and to make it felt. It has to be emotional, because that’s at the core of everything that he’s writing. It’s about emotion. And so you don’t want the technical to get in the way of that. So we had lots of meetings about it. We did previs, we do camera rehearsals, we work with the music team, we work with the choreographer, it has to be lit a certain way because we want to move the camera around the space. The focus pulling on that is exceptional. It’s a steady cam shot inside the interior space. So that needs to be worked out, because there are stitches in the shot. It’s one of those things where so many people help execute and make that happen. But at the core of it, it’s an emotional sequence that I think is very important to Ryan. So, everyone wanted to do a really good job – and you don’t want it to feel technical, you want it to feel emotional.
For Composer Ludwig Göransson and Songwriter Raphael Saadiq: What was your initial reaction when Ryan Coogler presented the idea of the “summoning spirits” sequence when Miles Caton’s character sings in the juke joint and the past, present, and future of music collide? Did you have a clear idea from the beginning on how you wanted to develop the music for the sequence?
Ludwig Göransson: Obviously, I’ve worked with Ryan now for almost 15 years – we’ve been friends and partners for a long time. So, I’m one of the first people that gets to read his scripts. He sent me the script in January, like four months before we shot the film. Everything was just kind of like a train. You read the script and you were like, “Okay, we’re shooting in four months.” But I remember reading the script, and the reaction I had when I read it is – I had the same reaction when I see it in the theater – goosebumps, because I’ve never read anything like that. I never thought you could portray music like that. Obviously, I’m also a performer, and I’ve been on stage, and I know the feeling when you get swept away in music, but it was just something about the way Ryan wrote it – how he wrote it out of a musician’s perspective. And that’s what’s just so crazy – how he could, even though he’s not a musician, how he could think like one. I feel like a lot of times when I talk to him, I feel like he does have that kind of – he can talk to me like the perspective from a music artist. You know, understanding how it feels to be on stage, and how time and the world disappears, and how you can connect with the future and the past. That’s a very powerful idea. The first thing that came to mind is asking Ryan like, “Do we want to use an original song here? Or do you want to use – there’s so much, obviously a rich history of music to choose from if you want to do a cover.” But Ryan was from the get-go very adamant, he wants this to feel completely original. And that’s when I was like, “Okay, well, if we’re going to make this happen, we need to invite a songwriter, an artist that can write with music that’s timeless, that has a foot in that history and understands that music – but also understands the music of today and the music of tomorrow.” And immediately, the first name I thought of was Raphael Saadiq. And I’ve been a fan for a long time. I saw Raphael play in Sweden in 2001. And I remember I had all the records – but on the records, he didn’t pose with an instrument, so I didn’t know that he was a musician. I obviously knew he was a songwriter, an incredible artist, but when he came on stage – I remember I was like 19 or 20 years old when he came on stage with the bass, and just started ripping crazy solos and singing at the same time – I was blown away. So since then, I’ve always wanted to work with him, and I finally got an opportunity here.
Raphael Saadiq: For me, I had the privilege of having Ludwig and Ryan telling me about and pitching me the scene of the movie. And getting to sit with Ludwig for an hour just talking about the film, what kind of film it was going to be – a very small film at first, and all these things – and I’m just trying to take it all in, because it’s a serious conversation. We both FaceTime Ryan, then Ryan gave me the history of his uncle and about the blues, and gave me this whole [history about] Christian faith versus the blues. And it was sort of [like] the house I grew up in. And he was sort of telling my story of growing up in a Baptist church, but also playing R&B – which, in some of my friends’ houses, they couldn’t play R&B. They couldn’t listen to Ohio Players. They called it devil music. So, when he was telling me this, I’m smirking the whole time. But at the same time, I’m thinking like, “Oh, I got to really dig deep.” And as he started giving me the scene about merging the history from Delta Blues and before Delta Blues until now, and showing the thread of history that he was putting together – I think at a certain point, I blanked out. And I was just thinking about, “What am I going to do? This is going to be amazing.” And with that type of pitch from Ludwig and Ryan, I feel like I was coached and equipped to go. And as soon as he hung up the phone, me and Ludwig just grabbed two guitars, and we must have jammed out for like an hour or two, just playing and playing. I knew what he was going to do, and what we were both going to do together. And at this point, I knew it was a bigger task than just the movie. I felt like this was going to be something that was going to be for generations and generations to come. So, I really had to dig deep. Me and Ludwig just put all the information that we had together, and we put everything on the table. And I was just waiting to see the film, and that was it. It was probably one of the most fun things I’ve done, but at the same time one of the most serious things that I had to say in a song.
Writer’s Note: Jacqueline Coley, the moderator of the virtual press conference, expands on my previous question and asks the following: Any specific top line memories from the first time you saw it all put together? Which, I’m sure you both saw it at various stages – but when it was done, if you have a specific recollection from that moment?
Ludwig Göransson: For me, this whole experience of this movie and working on this movie is something that was a completely new challenge for me in a way. Where normally I would go to set like one or two days out of the whole shoot – for this particular film, because there was so much music and so much on-screen music, Serena and I, we moved with our families to set. We were living in New Orleans for three months where we were part of this whole production, and breathing the film, and living in it, and meeting with the actors every day to figure out what we’re going to record tomorrow. And how we’re going to record. Like obviously we’re trying to do everything live because we also have this incredible cast, like Miles Caton – his music, out of this world. He’s so incredible, he learned to play guitar in three months, which is crazy. And his voice, right? This was a very complicated scene to shoot, because also it turns into IMAX – the whole scene is shot on IMAX, it’s a oner. We had to rehearse this shot like several days and several times with a choreographer, and we had an animation first. The visual effects team had done an animation, so I could take the song and score it to the animation before so I could visualize how long it would be, and when the different songs and the different types of musicians would come into the song. So it was a very long process, and in post – how we changed it, using the mix and using the atmosphere of the whole experience. But I will say, the first time when I saw it was on set when we were shooting it. I was on the side of the set, and I had my computer and my laptop, and we would do the takes – and every time we did a take, I would have to be there in the session, and make it longer or shorter depending on how fast the people were moving on every take. And also having Miles perform that. He’s starting the whole song, and that’s all live – like, he did that. I remember that day we shot that, when he started singing the song, and we did that for two hours maybe. And by the end of it – he played that guitar riff because he’s playing and singing live, so he played a guitar riff for two hours – and you know, he learned to play guitar in three months – but to play that riff over and over again for two hours, if you’re not like a guitar player for your life… he got a cramp in his hand I remember. He couldn’t close his hand after two hours, so we had to stop.
Raphael Saadiq: When I first saw it, I watched a screening with Ryan and his family and some friends from Oakland – a lot of directors – and I was in a dream. I didn’t know what I was seeing. I didn’t know what I was looking at. I think I was unconscious watching it. I couldn’t believe it, because last I heard it was at the studio [with] my voice. And then I heard this big voice from this kid. This “big blues voice,” my dad would say. And I think I saw it the second time at the Grand Lake Theater in Oakland where I grew up. Ryan showed it there. And I got to watch it with my peers and people I grew up with. But I will say this – I felt like I didn’t know what was going on. I actually saw the set before they shot it, the day I was in New Orleans for a festival. So, I stopped by and I saw the set empty. And that was it. And yeah, it felt like a dream sequence to watch it. When I watch it, I’m still blown away by it. Can’t believe that that piece went in so well. And the entire film starts with him singing that song. I don’t know what to say. I’m just kind of blown away by it like a fan.
“Sinners” is a singular work derived from generations of artistic inspiration, and how beautiful to realize that it will now be the source of inspiration for generations to come. The movies are in good hands.
Featured Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures’ “SINNERS,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release | Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
Thomas Manning is a member of the NCFCA and SEFCA, and also the co-host of the television show and radio program Meet Me at the Movies. He also serves as Senior Interviewer for Elements of Madness. He has worked as a production assistant and voting member on the Film Selection Committee for the Real to Reel Film Festival. Additionally, he manages his own film review and interview site, The Run-Down on Movies.
Manning is a graduate of Gardner-Webb University with a double-major in Communications and English. His passion for cinema and storytelling is rivaled only by his love for the music of Taylor Swift.
When he isn’t watching or talking about movies, you can usually find Manning drinking a ridiculous amount of coffee, going on spontaneous road trips, and running dozens of miles as he searches for the meaning of life.